When summer rolls around, a familiar bird in our backyard is the Baltimore oriole pictured above. One glance at her beak as she zooms through the backyard is enough to tell you the oriole has recently enjoyed a taste of the grape jelly in the backyard buffet. Hummingbirds, another common bird in Northeast Ohio during …
Blipping daffodils…part 2
In my blip yesterday, I wrote about the possibility of a freeze overnight and what that might do to my daffs. Well, we did have a freeze. First thing this morning I asked Alexa for a weather report. When she said it was 32 degrees, I dressed warmly, picked up my camera, and headed out …
Backyard birdy
At the end of an off-and-on rainy Sunday afternoon, just as I was watching out the kitchen window, this little finch popped in for a bite to eat. The weather has been variable today. Neither people nor wildlife knew what was going to come at them next, so most of the day they sheltered in …
Hats, gloves, and scarves!
Hello trail walkers! In my last post, I told you that the time has come to open the closet and sort out my hats, gloves, and hand warmers if I intend to continue trail walking, now that early Autumn has morphed into chilly winter weather. Last week we experienced our first snowfall, a real …
Special backyard visitors…
A pair of bluebirds made my heart happy today! I haven't seen a sign of either one in months, and I couldn't believe my eyes when I saw him sitting on top of the nesting box this morning. And then she joined him and together they checked out the neighborhood. She peered into the nest, …
An abrupt change
The blue jay landed, but didn't hang around for long, just long enough for me to get one good shot. Then he took off, and was replaced by a woodpecker. ...who posed long enough for us to see the red feathered "cap" on top of his head. Apparently he is proud of the bright …
Happy hummers
Unlike many backyard birders, I don't often see multiple hummingbirds when I look out the kitchen window. This month has been different, and today was a really lucky day. Enjoy the happy hummers and a couple of misfits at the end of today's post.And now for today's surprises... That's it for today's backyard birding post. …
An abundance of pileated woodpeckers
For the past month, these Woody Woodpecker look-alikes have been regularly visiting the trees in our backyard. They're not nesting here, but every day, morning, noon, and night, they fly in, help themselves to the woodpecker blocks and suet cakes, and provide us with entertainment. Just look at this pair. I'm no woodpecker expert, but …
Rainy days
Rain, rain, go away Come again some other day. Little Johnny wants to play. Running through my head repeatedly, that rhyme, remembered from my childhood, couldn't be more true to the way I feel about April...and now May! Little Johnny and Little Sally would like the rain to stop and the temperature to warm up …
Three of a kind
I'm always surprised when the pileated woodpecker appears at the backyard feeder. His visits haven't been very regular since last fall when we had to cut down the tall tree he liked to land on when he flew in. After landing on the tall oak tree, he and his mate would often fly across our …
SEEN ALONG THE TRAIL 